[clug] outlook advice [SEC=PERSONAL]

[Arjen Lentz]

Hi Antti

On 27/07/2009, at 11:55 AM, Roppola, Antti - BRS wrote:
> I'm hoping insular, monolithic groupware is a 1990's phenomenon we'll
> think back to when collaborating on a standards based collaborative
> network/mesh that has no artificial boundaries.


Interestingly, it appears that the monolithic vs modular is a phase  
rather than a case of enlightenment.
Monolithic products make sense when there's nothing "good enough" and  
no sensible modular boundaries/interfaces can be set at the time; I  
know SMTP/POP/IMAP are all standard-ish, the point is that for mail  
infrastructure you want domain and account management; the issue is  
admin/maint more than connecting. There are of course also the issues  
of addressbook and calendaring; there's LDAP and ical formats and  
interchange methods, but again managing it is not trivial.
So what you do in that case is build a product that does all, then you  
can make a client happy.
Over time, that situation shifts to integrated subsystems plugging  
into a modular environment; and that process keeps on going.

This process is well described in a good book called "The Innovator's  
Solution" by Clayton Christensen.

And yes I'd agree that Outlook (and also Exchange) have served many of  
their users very well, and the above explains why.

Cheers,
Arjen.
-- 
Arjen Lentz, Director @ Open Query (http://openquery.com)
Exceptional Services for MySQL at a fixed budget.

Follow our blog at http://openquery.com/blog/
OurDelta: free enhanced builds for MySQL @ http://ourdelta.org